m_findlow

Title: All downhill from here
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 601 words
Content notes: Written for Challenge 49 - Downhill at beattheblackdog
Summary: Sometimes it's best not to over think things

The vehicle wound its way through the tall hills and narrow valleys that snaked their way across the landscape. It was the kind of day when such a scenic style drive would have been thoroughly enjoyable had it not been marred by the fact that at the end of their destination lay work, rather than a relaxing afternoon picnic.

Finally they got close enough to the signal that they'd been following for a good hour and a half, the satnav providing limited guidance around the winding roads. Sometimes they had been double laned bitumen, sometimes single lane, and occasionally nothing more than a gravel track, not really a road, but merely a shortcut through some landowner's property. They pulled over on the soft green verge at the side of the road and stepped out, surveying the scene.

'How close are we?' Jack asked.

Ianto consulted the PDA and the readings coming from it. Looking up and around, before returning to the PDA, he realised it would be too much to ask for them to have an easy job of it.

'It's down there, somewhere,' he said pointing down into the valley. 'This was as close as the satnav could get us. From here it's on foot.'

Jack leaned over the PDA, getting his bearings, and then looking down at the valley which fell deeply into a small ravine at the end of the valley.

'It's steep,' Ianto said, checking it for himself, and feeling a little queasy at the drop.

'It's down there though, so that's where we have to go.'

As much as Ianto wasn't looking forward to it, they still didn't know what it was exactly. It could have been space junk, but then again, it could be some creature that needed their help. That was rift lotto for you.

Ianto looked down again. It was going to be tricky getting down there. It was grassy and the soil around these valleys was soft and springy, but the incline was by far the more challenging aspect.

'I suppose if we tied a rope to the front of the SUV, we could probably climb down. I wouldn't want to risk trying walking down without something to hang on to.'

Jack on the other hand had surveyed the climb and decided that it was too bright and sunny a day to get bogged down in negative thoughts about potential dangers. It wasn't really that steep, just a little tricky if you were standing upright. He had a very simple solution for that. He didn't bother suggesting anything to Ianto, simply sitting himself on the grass and throwing himself down the hill.

Ianto watched as Jack tumbled over and over on his side, careening down the hill like a fallen log, before coming to a complete halt at the bottom. When he didn't move, Ianto began to panic, convinced Jack must have hurt himself on the way down.

Awkwardly he clambered down the hillside, feet slipping out from under him several times on the damp grass, trying to gather bundles of it in his free hand and clutching desperately to them to steady himself, slipping and sliding along until he finally reached the bottom, having forgotten his plans not to descend without a rope. Jack's condition was all that mattered.

At the bottom he finally stumbled over to Jack's body, only to find him lying there, looking up at Ianto and grinning madly, his hair all askew and his coat covered in bits of grass and twig.

'Oh, I haven't had that much fun in years,' Jack said. 'Let's do that again!'